In Options > Preferences > General, disable Close media files when not the active application. As DaveT2 points out, it seems as if the external HD is not ready before MS wants to read them.

Can you drag the WMV files to the timeline in a new project?

This may or may not work, after opening the project (with the media files offline), Select All and copy. Open a new instance of MS and paste into it. You may get lucky and get the events to copy. This is method to recover from a corrupted project file.

it actually is an internal drive. and i tried loading the project again but for some reason is freezes when it reaches 30%

here's an error report. im having the same problem but with a different file now:

Extra Information
File: C:\Users\Joe Winko\AppData\Local\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum\11.0\dx_video_grovel_x86.log
File: C:\Users\Joe Winko\AppData\Local\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum\11.0\svfx_video_grovel_x86.log
File: C:\Users\Joe Winko\AppData\Local\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum\11.0\dx_grovel_x86.log
File: C:\Users\Joe Winko\AppData\Local\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum\11.0\vst_grovel.log
File: A:\Horror Movie Files\Friday the 13th\Footage\CLAIREKELSEYCABIN.vf

Problem Description
Application Name: Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum
Application Version: Version 11.0 (Build 322)
Problem: Unmanaged Exception (0xc0000005)
Fault Module: C:\Program Files (x86)\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 11.0\VegasMovieStudioPE110.exe
Fault Address: 0x00765C32
Fault Offset: 0x00365C32

Fault Process Details
Process Path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Sony\Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 11.0\VegasMovieStudioPE110.exe
Process Version: Version 11.0 (Build 322)
Process Description: Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum
Process Image Date: 2012-04-05 (Thu Apr 05) 21:48:38




***I also recorded a video of whats going on:

i tried doing that but it didnt seem to work either:


i couldnt copy and paste them at all either
all the video files are wmv too... could that be the cause of it?

I watched your video but you didn't address this question:

Can you drag the WMV files to the timeline in a new project?

If you can, does the preview still show red?

Can you play the .wmv files in another app, such as VLC?

However, after searching for "wmv red" using the Search tool, I found this thread:

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?ForumID=12&MessageID=818736

So, I will ask, what version of QuickTime do you have?

Added: Are you still on Vista-32? I'm not sure what difference it will make but I have XP SP3 with v11 and QT 7.7.4. I found a WMV file and it plays fine here.

my WMV videos play fine with VLC media player. and im not using vista anymore, im using windows 7 64 bit,
and the version of quicktime im using is "Quick time 7" (or atleast i think it is, this is how i figured it out:

i also tried draging the wmv files out of the timeline and into a different project, it worked, but some videos in the file are offline and didnt drag over at all.